Navigation basics

Use the home feed to choose a feed or tag, open an article, and reach a person's article lists. From those destinations, continue to article and profile tasks.

Navigation basics

Navigation connects the home page to Your Feed, Global Feed, tag links, article pages, and profile pages. The home route and the tag route open the home page; an article route opens the article page; and profile child routes display article lists.

Before you start

Prerequisites

• Know whether you are signed in. Your Feed appears for authenticated users.
• Have the tag, article, or profile destination you want to open. These destinations carry a tag, article slug, or username in their route.
• To add a comment from an article, use the authenticated comment form. When you are signed out, the article offers Sign in or sign up instead.

Steps

1. Open the home feed.
2. Decide whether you need a feed, tag, article, or profile destination.

Result: You are on the home feed and know whether to choose a feed, tag, article, or profile destination.

Choose a feed or browse by tag

A feed is an article list selected by the feed tab; a tag is a link that takes you to an article list filtered by that tag.

Prerequisites

• Start on the home feed.
• To use Your Feed, be signed in.

Steps

1. Select one of these options:

   If you need to…	Select
   Read articles from users you follow	Your Feed
   Read the global article list	Global Feed
   Read articles grouped under a topic	A tag under Popular Tags

2. Confirm that the article list has loaded.

3. If you selected a tag, confirm that the tag appears as the active tab.

The home feed can show Loading tags... while tags load and No tags are here... yet. when the loaded tag list is empty. The article list can show Loading articles... while articles load. An empty following list shows Your feed is empty. Follow some users to see their articles here, or check out the Global Feed!; an empty article list shows No articles are here... yet.

Result: The selected feed or tag article list is on screen and ready for the next destination.

Open an article and choose an article task

An article destination is the page for reading an article and continuing to article tasks. It contains the article title, body, tags, comments, and article actions.

Prerequisites

• Start from an article list or another article link.
• To comment, be signed in; the signed-out article offers Sign in and sign up.

Steps

1. Select an article from the article list.

2. Choose the article task you need:

   If you need to…	Select
   Edit the article	Edit Article
   Delete the article	Delete Article
   Save or remove the article from your favorites	Favorite Article or Unfavorite Article
   Write a comment	Write a comment...
   Add the comment	Post Comment

3. If the article cannot load, look for Failed to load article.

Result: The article destination is on screen, or the selected article task has been opened.

Open a profile and switch profile lists

A profile destination displays a person's profile information and the article list associated with that profile.

Prerequisites

• Start from a profile link or a profile route.
• Have the username for the profile destination.

Steps

1. Open the profile destination.

2. Select one of these tabs:

   If you need to…	Select
   Read the profile's posts	My Posts
   Read the profile's favorited posts	Favorited Posts

3. Confirm that the selected article list is displayed.

Result: The selected profile article list is on screen for the next navigation choice.

Choose the available navigation branch

Authentication and ownership determine which navigation controls appear on the home, article, and profile surfaces.

Prerequisites

• Know whether you are signed in.
• On an article or profile, know whether the displayed record belongs to you.

Steps

1. Select the control shown for your situation:

   If you are…	Select
   Signed in on the home feed	Your Feed
   The article owner	Edit Article or Delete Article
   Reading another person's article	Follow or Unfollow; Favorite Article or Unfavorite Article
   Signed in on an article	Write a comment... and Post Comment
   Signed out on an article	Sign in or sign up
   Viewing your own profile	Edit Profile Settings
   Viewing another person's profile	Follow or Unfollow

Result: The controls for your authentication and ownership situation are on screen, and you can continue with the task that matches your situation.

When navigation content is missing or loading

Loading and empty messages tell you whether a list is still loading or has no items. An article-load message identifies an article that did not load.

Continue from the destination

Use the destination as the hand-off point to the task you want to complete.